2021 American Athletic Conference men's basketball tournament

The 2021 American Athletic Conference men's basketball tournament was the postseason men's basketball tournament for the American Athletic Conference. It was held at the Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas from March 11–14.^[1]

2021 American Athletic Conference men's basketball tournament
Classification	Division I
Season	2020–21
Teams	11
Site	Dickies Arena Fort Worth, Texas
Champions	Houston (1st title)
Winning coach	Kelvin Sampson (1st title)
MVP	Quentin Grimes (Houston)
Television	ESPN, ESPNU, ESPN2
American Athletic Conference men's basketball tournaments ← 2020 2022 →

2020–21 American Athletic Conference men's basketball standings

v t e	Conf.							Overall
Team	W		L		PCT			W		L		PCT
Wichita State	11	–	2		.846			16	–	6		.727
No. 6 Houston †	14	–	3		.824			28	–	4		.875
Memphis	11	–	4		.733			20	–	8		.714
SMU	7	–	4		.636			11	–	6		.647
Cincinnati	8	–	6		.571			12	–	11		.522
UCF	8	–	10		.444			11	–	12		.478
Tulsa	7	–	9		.438			11	–	12		.478
South Florida	4	–	10		.286			9	–	13		.409
Temple	4	–	10		.286			5	–	11		.313
Tulane	4	–	12		.250			10	–	13		.435
East Carolina	2	–	10		.167			8	–	11		.421
† 2021 AAC tournament winner Rankings from AP poll

Seeds

The top five teams received a bye into the quarterfinals. Teams were seeded by record within the conference, with a tiebreaker system^[2] to seed teams with identical conference records. Tiebreakers: win–loss record, head-to-head record, record against the highest ranked team outside of the tied teams, record against the second highest ranked team outside of the tied teams, etc.

Seed	School	Conference	Overall	Tiebreaker
1	Wichita State	11–2	15–4
2	Houston	14–3	21–3
3	Memphis	11–4	15–7
4	SMU	7–4	11–4
5	Cincinnati	8–6	10–10
6	UCF	8–10	10–11
7	Tulsa	7–9	11–11
8	South Florida	4–10	8–12	1–0 vs Cincinnati
9	Temple	4–10	5–10	0–2 vs Cincinnati
10	Tulane	4–12	9–12
11	East Carolina	2–10	8–10

Schedule

Game	Time[3]	Matchup#	Score	Television	Attendance
First round – Thursday, March 11
1	11:00 AM	No. 8 South Florida vs No. 9 Temple	73–71	ESPNU
2	2:00 PM	No. 7 Tulsa vs No. 10 Tulane	70–77
3	7:00 PM	No. 6 UCF vs No. 11 East Carolina	72–62	ESPN2
Quarterfinals – Friday, March 12
4	11:00 AM	No. 1 Wichita State vs No. 8 South Florida	68–67	ESPN2
5	2:00 PM	No. 4 SMU vs No. 5 Cincinnati	71–74		778
6	6:00 PM	No. 2 Houston vs No. 10 Tulane	77–52
7	9:00 PM	No. 3 Memphis vs No. 6 UCF	70–62		826
Semifinals – Saturday, March 13
8	2:00 PM	No. 1 Wichita State vs No. 5 Cincinnati	59–60	ESPN2
9	4:30 PM	No. 2 Houston vs No. 3 Memphis	76–74		1,182
Championship Game – Sunday, March 14
10	2:15 PM	No. 2 Houston vs No. 5 Cincinnati	91–54	ESPN
Game times in CT. #-denote tournament seeding.

Bracket

	First round Thursday, March 11					Quarterfinals Friday, March 12					Semifinals Saturday, March 13					Championship Sunday, March 14
						1	Wichita State	68
						8	South Florida	67
	8	South Florida	73
	9	Temple	71
											1	Wichita State	59
											5	Cincinnati	60
						4	SMU	71
						5	Cincinnati	74
																5	Cincinnati	54
																2	#7 Houston	91
						2	#7 Houston	77
						10	Tulane	52
	7	Tulsa	70
	10	Tulane	77
											2	#7 Houston	76
											3	Memphis	74
						3	Memphis	70
						6	UCF	62
	6	UCF	72
	11	East Carolina	62

^[4]

See also

• 2021 American Athletic Conference women's basketball tournament